The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus such as an electronic copying apparatus.
An electronic copying apparatus is constructed so that a copy of a document is produced in a copying cycle having processes for charging the surface of a photoconductive drum, exposing the charged surface to form an electrostatic latent image thereon, developing the latent image into a toner image, transferring the toner image to paper, and cleaning the photoconductive drum after the transfer. In the cleaning process, a cleaning blade is pressed against the photoconductive drum to scrape off toner remaining on the drum. Conventionally, the cleaning blade is adapted to be pressed against the photoconductive drum during a copying operation, and to be removed from the drum after the copying operation is ended. In other words, the cleaning blade is pressed against and removed from the photoconductive drum for each copying cycle. If this copying cycle is repeated many times, the toner will flow to the back of the cleaning blade, exerting a bad influence on the image formation at the time of developing.